Love You
by mandiekro
Summary: In the aftermath of what Kitty and Lance said to each other in 'Mainstream', the two mutants admit to themselves and to each other what they've been trying to deny for too long. Lancitty. One-shot. Very fluffy. Rated T for, like, one word. Apologies for awful summary.


Lance started to advance. Kitty walked forward to meet him. "This is the real you isn't it? You're nothing but a hood!" Kitty was surprised at the words even as they tumbled out of her mouth.

Lance looked surprised, even hurt, at her words. But after a moment, that expression was gone, replaced by stony anger. "Right! I'll never be good enough for you!" Guilt shook Kitty in its power, and she took a few steps back. Then she took a deep breath and readied herself for a fight.

But still, laying in bed that night. she couldn't stop thinking about it. The way he'd looked at her. The way he'd so willingly attacked her. For a moment the thought, 'My Lance wouldn't act this way,' flitted through her head. But that _was _her Lance. And she loved him for it.

Wait- loved him? She didn't know where that thought had come from, but she suddenly felt sure of it. Her feelings for Lance weren't just something that would go away, were they? And, she suddenly decided, she didn't care. This was Lance, and she didn't care what the others would say. And she had so totally blown her chances with him.

He must hate her. He must completely and totally despise her. She had called him a hood! She knew how much that had hurt him. Had seen it in his eyes when his mask of cool aloofness had faltered for that tiny moment. What had he said afterward? 'I'll never be good enough for you.' She had felt awful. He was definitely good enough for her. Her parents probably wouldn't approve, seeing as how he had tried to kill them and all, but still.

She loved Lance, for real, and her chances with him were completely shot. She sunk through her bed, through the floor, and landed with a thud on the floor in the empty, dark living room, where she was sure she wouldn't wake anyone. And she allowed herself to sob.

Lance lay in his bed in the Brotherhood House, staring up at the cracked and filthy ceiling. Her voice kept ringing in his ears. 'This is the real you isn't it? You're nothing but a hood!' How many times had he heard those words, or a variation of them. His mother before she'd thrown him out. The other kids at the orphanage. His last foster parents. The other kids at Bayville. And now the only person he'd ever _really _cared about.

He should hate her. Should completely and utterly despise the girl. But he couldn't. No matter how hard he tried, no matter how much he wanted to listen to the others and stop liking her, he couldn't. He couldn't hate her. Because he loved her.

Wait- loved her? Huh. He guessed he did love her. He had always known there was something different about how he felt about Kitty than about how he had felt about other girls in the past. And now he had totally blown his chances with her. He stood up and rammed his shoulder into the wall, cursing at himself. He didn't care that he had probably woken the others.

He ran. He ran out into the woods where he unleashed his powers, letting them out with his shame and sorrow. 'You're nothing but a hood!' Trees fell. 'This is the real you isn't it?' Cracks opened in the earth. And, a mile or so away, sitting, tears falling, in her living room, Kitty felt the tremors.

She stood immediately and ran out to the garage, not bothering to change out of her pink pajamas, and jumped into the driver's seat of Scott's car. She phased her hand through the locked glove compartment, grabbed the spare keys and slid them into the ignition. Scott was so going to kill her. She set out in the direction of the Brotherhood House.

The house, although it seemed to shudder with each tremor, was evidently not the source of the earthquakes. It seemed to be coming from the forest. She ran to the thick woods and through them in a straight line, phasing through trees and stones and tree roots and following the trail of destruction. She finally made it to a clearing, where Lance stood, his eyes rolled back in his head and most of trees fallen.

He seemed to have also disregarded what he was wearing, as he was dressed in only a pair of plaid pajama bottoms, which were slung low enough to make heat flow through Kitty's cheeks, and he wasn't even wearing shoes.

"Lance!" She yelled over the ever-loudening sound of shaking earth. He didn't hear her. "Lance!" She yelled louder. Still nothing. She wasn't sure of he actually couldn't hear her or if he was just ignoring her, which he had perfectly good reason to. "Lance!" That time he heard her.

Lance stared, shocked as Kitty walked over to him, adorned in only pink pajamas. "Kitty?" She was the last person he had expected to see, and he was suddenly extremely conscious of the fact that he probably looked even worse in her eyes right now. "Lance!" She seemed to sigh in relief, and ran to him, hugging him close to her. "Kitty what-" But she cut him off. By _kissing _him.

Kitty was surprised, even as she melted into Lance. She hadn't planned on kissing him. They had _never_ kissed, probably because kissing usually meant a relationship, and the X-Men and the Brotherhood would absolutely murder them if they were in a relationship. But... it felt so _good_.

Kitty had probably thought about kissing Lance at least once every single time she saw him, even though half of those times were on the battlefield. And, even though he had thought he hated her, had thought that he would never want to _see_ her again, much less kiss her. And yet...

When Kitty first kissed him, he had been too shocked to do anything about it. She had pulled away from him after a second, her cheeks as red as Wanda's uniform, and mumbled something like, "I should probably just, like, go before I, like, embarrass myself more," though he couldn't be sure. But he had found it in him to move and had already leaned down to kiss her again.

Lance had kissed girls before. Lance had kissed dozens of girls before. He had been the playboy at his last school, and probably the only girl there who he _hadn't_ kissed at one point or another was Kitty. And kissing Kitty was so... different. It was better. It meant something.

"Lance." She murmured after a few minutes. He pulled away from her. "Yeah?" He asked. "I'm really, really sorry." Lance looked at her, taken aback. "_You're_ sorry? I'm the one who was an asshole. I attacked you without reason, or warning." "Yeah, but I, like, called you a hood when you're so totally not." "I'm not?" "You thought I meant that? Lance! I could never think something so awful about someone I l- really like."

Kitty had been about to say that she loved him, but she didn't want him to be weirded out. "Were- were you going to say that you love me?" Lance asked quietly, hesitantly. Un-Lance-like. "I- yeah. I was. I didn't want you to, like, be freaked out or anything." Lance kissed her again. "I love you too." He murmured against her lips. She just kept kissing him.


End file.
